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Twice a Day a Bus at the End of the Known World: Khonoma

Your search for transport seemed endless, but then your bus turned around the last corner of the dirt road leading to this tiny gem et voilà: Khonoma green village, empty, even though it’s promoted by the (equally empty) state tourism board of Nagaland. Only 20km west of Kohima, but on the way you were wondering, if the overloaded bus will make it across the halfway falling-apart bridges and through the washed in deeply potholes. Roads here have got a tough life.

We arrived mid-day, streets as empty as the blue crisp skies above us, only the occasional bird song and bee’s humming disturbing the peaceful silence. Where do we stay? Where do we go? Two smiling faces walked down the path winding through the houses towards us.

Hello, good day. Where can we go? Where can we stay? – The girls looked at each other and started discussing. We looked at each other and started to worry.

Finally, one of them waved us over, asked us to follow and went up the steep stairs. Her aunt runs a homestay in Khonoma. Well, she runs the homestay in Khonoma, the so far only accommodation available in the village.

Three clans of one tribe are living in Khonoma, it has a population of around 3000 people, many living in houses without running water, most streets not accessible by car. Small shops, more stairs than canals in Venice, flowers, lots and lots of flowers, very crisp, clean air, houses with green tin roofs all surrounded by rice fields. You’ll feel like you are sitting in a movie: Your kids playing peacefully in the meadows, your partner bringing a hot tea from the fire-place. Peace. Birds around you. Ah!

This is when you are a tourist. Doing homestay you are not only becoming part of the family, the insight in to the life of the Naga people is also priceless:

Hard work from sunrise to sunset with only Sunday off, living in houses with stone foundation but bamboo walls,

windows often without glass in an area where you got snow each winter for a few days, heating with charcoal in buckets, carrying each liter of water up the hill. Each liter you wanna have in this tea-pot or you’d like to use for cooking, for your laundry, to wash yourself or to even flush the toilet – it filled me with deep respect.

Still the Naga people seem to have enough energy, to foster beauty around them, to plant flowers and paint houses in the most beautiful colours. A lot of happy people we saw, not one angry or unfriendly person crossing our path. Never a complaint to hear of a fight to witness. Heaven on earth.

After a few days we realized that the large stone monuments to be found all over the village are tombs. The death are kept close to the living and the inscriptions showed ages proving the Khonoma life-style must be not so bad for people – most reached an age far beyond 80, we even met a happily alive 112 year old woman, who lives alone close to our hosts house. Her husband died three years ago aged 103. The church’s books prove the age. We are impressed.

Lot’s lot’s more to tell about Khonoma – traditionally sustainable rice farming with the help of trees collecting nitrogen on their roots, meeting an agriculture scientist who studied in Tel Aviv and speaks Hebrew, amazing food cooked by Baby Vikedono and her nice Meza, a terrace with a view you wanna swap a kingdom for if you’d had one, an uncountable amount of orchids growing in the dense forests, world’s last remaining retreat of the Blyth’s Tragopan, the feel of total isolation from the known world – you name it.

And last not least: try to reach the Dzukou Valley. Not accessible by car, from Khonoma the Dzukou or Dzuko is only a steep but easy to find two-hour walk and if you look at some images here – you can only imagine the paradise you’ll find.

Hi, I stumbled upon your blog when trying to look for more information about Kohima. The homestay at Khonoma seems amazing! Do you mind me asking when are the two buses from Kohima to Khonoma and where to take the bus from, as well as how much the homestay costs per night? Thanks!

Heya Ashley,
there is one bus VERY early in the morning (when we were in town short after 5am) from the NSTA central bus terminal. the second one is a private bus and there are only rumours about the schedule: timetable and bus stops seem to be a secret only for those who know. And believe me: we asked many people!
My best guess is: get in touch with Baby. She is very helpful, speaks incredibly well English and will provide you with all information you need. We found her homestay by coincidence running in to her nice on the street. Make sure you DO arrange something before hand because: had we not bumped in to her nice or had the homestay been booked out, it had been three days out in the rain for us – there is no other accomodation available in this lovely place Khonoma.
Prices vary. You need more privacy, running water and your own space? You might get a own house and possibly even western toilets, but it will cost more.
We paid for a room in a shared house (very clean, lovely decoration of house and garden, excellent food, 3 meals a day included, very homy feel but no proper heating, no glass in the windows, lots of power cuts, no running water etc) 650 Rp per person and night. Might have been off-season. April it was.

Thanks for the reply. I am in fact quite used to little privacy and a lot of power and water cuts, since I have been living for a while in a small town in Tamil Nadu doing a public health project for rural communities. Rs 650 is an amazing price for what you have just described!

I probably will spend a week in Nagaland, would you recommend more days in Kohima or Khonoma? I definitely plan to go to Dzukou Valley for a day (and maybe Japfu Peak if I am adventurous, but I highly doubt so). I love to wander around villages, just taking in the sights and sounds, so it’s a tough decision trying to decide which to spend more days in.

The place we stayed in Meghalaya – Cherrapunjee Holiday Resort – is run by a Khasi women who married a man from Tamil Nadu…this is how I know Tamil Nadu🙂
Definitely go for the country when you love hiking. Kohima is lovely, reminded us a Southern American city…but it is vast and spread out and it takes a lot of time to get out of town in fact…
Kohima’s city centre is definitely worth a stroll…markets early in the morning – wow. but I’d stay longer in Khonoma and hike from there.

I was actually looking at Shillong and Cherapunjee before deciding to go to Nagaland instead. It’s unfortunately the monsoon season now, so even if I go to Cherapunjee, it wouldn’t be ideal for me to trek around the area in the rain. I would probably try to go there in the future when it is the dry season.

I’ve decided on my Nagaland plans. As per your advice, I am spending more days in Khonoma compared to Kohima and I’ve also budgeted 3 days for a homestay in Kigwema Village. I am positive that t will be amazing!